


Hot Summer Nights: A Teenage Love Story

by homicidalbrunette



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst heavy, Dark Comedy, F/M, Gen, Implied Sexual Content, Marijuana and drug usage, Mike and El are aged up to high school seniors here, Mike and Steve are in the drug dealing biz, Movie AU, gratuitous 80s and early 90s references, hot summer nights, hot summer nights au, mike and steve friendship, mileven starting in chapter 2, steve being a mom to mike is big in this fic, there will be angst later on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2019-05-07
Packaged: 2019-06-07 06:25:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15213134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/homicidalbrunette/pseuds/homicidalbrunette
Summary: “Everything was a lie.” Her voice was small. She had finally stopped walking. “Everything."“I’m sorry, El…” Mike trailed off, instinctively searching for words to defend himself and finding none. He didn’t know what to say. But he was desperate. “I know that I hurt you, but I -”“Stop selling drugs.”---------------The Hot Summer Nights AU no one asked for. Mike Wheeler, former nerd loser, joins King Steve in the small-time weed-dealing business summer of '91, and embarks on teenage romance for the first time. Turns out though his summer mystery girl is none other than Jane ‘El’ Hopper, daughter of buzzkill Police Chief Jim Hopper, who’s been itching for an excuse to finally throw Steve and his ne’er-do-well friends in jail for good… OFF HIATUS.





	1. And So It Began

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the fact that ST season 3 is going to be set during the summer, coupled with a viewing of Hot Summer Nights, a movie about an unassuming pale brunette nerd boy in the summer of '91. Some spoilers for Hot Summer Nights (2017), though I grafted two different plotlines together, so this isn’t really how the plot of the movie actually goes. Some lines used here are direct quotes from the HSN movie/script. All credit for Stranger Things to the Duffer Bros and all credit for Hot Summer Nights to Elijah Bynum.

**_The following is based on a true story. More or less…._ **

1989 had been the year Mike Wheeler’s dad died. It was sudden and swift; a heart attack. Ted Wheeler had been a man's man. The kind of guy who shaved with a straight razor, ordered off the menu for his wife, and traded millions a day in stocks. The kind of man Mike would never become. When he died, the light went out of Mike’s eyes a little. His grades plummeted, he started stealing from his sister Nancy, cursing out his teachers, and graffitiing bathroom walls. One cold February day in 1991, Mike burned all the baseball cards his dad had ever given him. Somehow he thought it would help him cope. What it did instead was start a huge fire that burned down the Wheelers’ garage and spread to half their neighbor’s front lawn. Mike said it was a mistake; the school psychologist said it was a cry for help.

So that summer, 17-year-old Mike Wheeler found himself behind the cash register at his aunt’s shop for overpriced tourist bait. He had been shipped off to Hawkins, a bumfuck seaside resort town off the Cape, in some misguided bid by his mother to rehabilitate her troubled son. It was the summer of ’91, and it was the beginning of what would be the hottest summer in 68 years. When the heat wave hit at the end of May, most people thought it would last a week, but it wouldn’t end until the hurricane hit in August. In fact, everything in Mike Wheeler’s world would end with that hurricane.

But Mike, sitting in that empty store, feeling like he was sweating out of every body part, didn’t know all that then. He was focused on positioning his gangly body, all six feet of which he was still getting used to, within the vicinity of the one electric fan in the store, when Steve Harrington burst through the cheap screen doors.  

Now, there are two types of people in Hawkins in the summer: the townies and the summer birds. The summer birds flocked into Hawkins every summer from places like Connecticut and New York, with their white clothes, their white cars, and their White last names like Rothschild, Carrington, or Chesterfield. Oh, and all their kids had names like Tanner, Kendall, or Cody.

But Steve Harrington was a townie. He didn’t own any fancy cars, clothes or have a fancy name, but every time Mike saw him, there was always some hot chick on his arm. And always a smile on his face. It had been 96 degrees when Steve strode through the shop doors, but that cold-blooded motherfucker wasn’t sweating.

It should be noted that the summer birds absolutely loved to get high. Those assholes loved to smoke weed, even the adults. They came to Hawkins to disconnect from the outside world, and that’s exactly what Steve Harrington helped them do. They’d come into his shop for a muffler and leave with some of the best shit south of Route 6. If you were around the Cape, and especially Hawkins, in the late 80s to early 90s, you knew the name Steve Harrington.

Everyone knew the stories. You’d hear them at a party or a barbeque or at a bar. Like the one where his dick was 10 inches long, or that he had killed a man, or that he’d been expelled from high school because he had slept with the principal’s wife…and never called her back.

If you asked local law enforcement, they’d say he was a criminal. If you asked his teachers, they’d tell you he was a waste of talent. And if you asked a Kendall Carrington, they’d tell you King Steve was wicked fucking hot.

Yeah, there were a lot of stories about King Steve, but at the end of the night, when everyone had sobered up and gone home, Steve was just another townie. And he knew that’s all he’d ever be seen as. 

“Hide this.” 

Mike stared down at the dime bag of weed in front of him, and then at Steve Harrington, and then at the Hawkins PD car pulling up in front of the store. Surprising both himself and Steve, Mike grabbed the dime bag and threw it behind the cash drawer, pushing it shut just as one of Hawkins' finest strolled in.

Steve had disappeared down one of the back aisles. The officer scanned the room, an unsatisfied look on his face, before resting his eyes on Mike. “You seen Harrington?”  

Mike did his best to look confused, “Harrington, sir?” 

The officer sighed, exasperated. “Preppy-looking kid, big hair…ring a bell?” When all he got was another confused look, he sighed, seeming to give up, and grabbed a Coke. He plopped a five-dollar bill on the counter. 

Mike automatically went to open the register before remembering what was inside. He paused, hand in mid-air. “It’s uh, it’s on the house.” He added, smiling innocently, “Officer.”

The guy grunted. With one last look around the place, he grabbed the Coke, nodded in Mike’s general direction, and left.

Steve re-appeared behind a magazine rack, tossing aside an issue of  _American Angler._ He stared at Mike expectantly.

“Oh! Right. Sorry.” Feeling like an idiot, Mike punched a few buttons and the register sprang open. “Here you go,” he mumbled, tossing the dime bag back to Steve.

“Thanks kid.”

“No problem.” Here was finally his chance. King Steve was finally in front of him,  _talking_  to him, and he’d just done the guy a huge fucking favor. This was probably the only opportunity he’d have to get on Steve’s good side, and maybe, just maybe, leverage some social capital and get the fuck out of sweating his balls off the entire summer in this store. “You know…I’ve got like a whole storage room of beer back here, and you throw a lot of parties – I mean, so I’ve heard - so maybe next time….”  _Fuck it._  “Next time, I mean, if you have another soiree… I could maybe swing by? Bring some libations?”

Soiree? Libations? What the fuck? It felt like an eternity. And then, Steve smirked. “You get high?”

And so it began.


	2. This Is a Story About Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As she reached for the door handle, her eyes lingered on his. “What’s your name?” 
> 
> “Mike.” He thought of King Steve, with his shiny red Camaro and his endless bevy of hot chicks. “But people call me Mikey.”
> 
> She raised an eyebrow. “Why Mikey?”
> 
> “’Cause…it’s cool,” he said, suddenly feeling entirely uncool. 
> 
> There was an amused look on her face, and something else he couldn't quite identify. “Goodnight Mike.”
> 
> And with that, she walked away, the slight figure of her body receding from his headlights into the darkness. 
> 
> “Hey!” He’d almost forgotten. How dumb could he be? “What’s your name?”
> 
> She didn’t stop walking, but she looked back over her shoulder at him. “El.” 
> 
> L? “Wait – like, like the letter?” But this time, she didn’t turn back around. Mike watched her walk away, taking a long and steady pull from his inhaler.

Friday night, another swelter, but it wasn’t the heat that was making Mike sweat. 

“…summer bird?”

The blonde had come out of nowhere. He had been nursing a Solo cup of indeterminate liquids, trying to look like he belonged at this kegger, and failing miserably. Technically, Steve had invited him, but it seemed that the guy wasn’t even at his own damn party.   

“Yeah, totally,” he blurted. Years of social anxiety had conditioned him to respond in the affirmative to pretty much anything, even though most of the time it just made him look more stupid when it came out that he hadn’t actually processed a single word. Like now. “Wait. What?” 

All around him, the party raged on. A group of guys who looked like they were all named Chad were competitively chugging near the lawn, two lovebirds by the door had been sloppily sucking face for at least 20 minutes, and somewhere inside, the loudest speakers known to man were blasting Color Me Badd. Where the fuck was Steve already? 

“Are you a summer bird?” the blonde tried again. She was wearing a pink cardigan, pink shorts, and pearls. She was kind of cute, in a bland Reagan youth kind of way. He had no idea what the fuck she was doing talking to him.

“Oh, uh, no.” He replied, lamely.

“You from here?” 

The speakers were blasting Heavy D now. Did she ask if he liked deers? “What?”

A look of annoyance crept over her face. “ARE YOU FROM HERE?” 

Ohhhh. Was he from here. “No, no,” he replied, “Are you from –" But before he could even finish the sentence, she had already moved past him, in search of other conversation partners. Mike sighed.  _Another one dazzled by my endless charm._  

“Hey shop boy!”  _Good timing._ Mike watched as Steve finally appeared, pulling up on the lawn in a cherry red Camaro, a cigarette dangling loosely from his lips, like he was some teenaged Joe fucking Camel. “What are you doing standing out here for?” 

“What? I, uh –" There was that social anxiety again. “I was just –” 

“You know it’s better inside, right?” Steve pushed him through the doors. But instead of stopping by the pool, where most of the partygoers seemed to be, Steve made a beeline for a room in the back. Feeling like a fish out of water, Mike followed meekly.  

“I brought over some stuff from the shop. A lot of stuff, actually. It’s um, it’s in the fridge.”

“Great, great. Thanks, kid.” The room they entered was dimly lit, and filled entirely with smoke. A guy was sprawled with his face flat on the floor, passed out. At least, Mike  _hoped_  he was just passed out. Already, he could feel his chest tightening in response to the smoke.  _Come on, keep it together._  He willed himself not to cough.

Three shirtless dudes wearing backwards Red Sox caps were on the couch, passing around a bright green bong.

“This is the guy who brought over the brew,” Steve threw an arm around Mike. “Uh, what’s your name again?” 

“Mike.” The Dudes looked up at him with glazed eyes. He couldn’t tell if they were unimpressed or just very, very stoned. “Michael,” he tried again. “Well, my mom -"  

Thankfully, Steve interrupted. “I’m gonna call you Mikey.”

“Mikey. Okay.” Mike nodded. “Why Mikey?”

“’Cause it’s cool.” Steve looked at him like it was the most obvious statement in the world. 

_Sure, why not._  He would’ve been happy if Steve called him Sue, at this point. “Yeah, okay. Mikey.”

“Mikey. Batter up.” One of the Dudes held up the bong. It was his turn. 

_Shit shit shit._ Mike felt like he needed to take a hit off of his inhaler, not a fucking bong.  _Rest in peace, lungs._  

Steve gave him an odd look. “You ever smoke before?”

“Of course,” Mike lied. 

“Well, you’ve drank before, right?”

“Yeah, of course,” Mike lied again.  _Like an hour ago, when I first got here._

“Then there’s nothing to it, bud.” 

Mike put his mouth on the bong. Steve lit the bowl. Mike inhaled. Deeply. Too deeply. 

“The force is strong with you, young Skywalker.” Vaguely, he felt Steve pat him on the back. It felt like it was happening to another person.  _That wasn’t so bad._

Then it hit him.

His lungs burned. It felt like they were on fire. He began to cough, and found he couldn’t stop. He had a vague impulse to reach for his inhaler, but couldn’t remember where he had put it. 

Steve saw the kid’s eyes glaze over.  _Thud!_ Then he dropped to the floor like a bag of concrete _._

“Kid – you okay, kid? Mikey!” For a split second, Steve thought the hit might have killed him. Then, a slow grin spread over Mike’s dazed ass face. A fucking grin. 

That was the first time Steve had ever seen the kid smile.    

*****

This story isn’t about Mike Wheeler, or Steve Harrington, or weed. This is a story about love.

_“Hold me.”_

Terminator 2 had just come out that summer. Mike, being a die-hard fan of the first movie, was there on opening night, sitting in his mom’s beat up ’82 Camry at the local drive-in theater. Alone. 

_“I love you, I always will.”_  They were at the part where Sarah Conner hallucinates seeing her dead boyfriend in the looney bin. It was getting hard to pay attention though, because the couple in the car in front of him were getting into an increasingly loud argument. Mike saw a figure of a girl climb out, slamming the car door shut. The guy inside was screaming something at her that Mike couldn’t make out over the blaring of the movie intercoms, where Linda Hamilton was crying, _"Oh God...Kyle. I need you so much."_

Mike squinted.  _Shit._ The girl was headed his way. He hoped she hadn’t seen him staring.  _Way to look like a creep, Mikey._ He quickly put his head back down but the sound of the passenger door opening brought it back up. She was sliding next to him in the passenger seat.  _Fuck._  

“They stop Skynet but Schwarzenegger has to kill himself in hot magma. So, can you take me home now?”

Mike would find out later that the girl who had just slid into his car, practically onto his lap, had been the fantasy of every boy in Hawkins in 1991. She was the biggest fox for 50 miles around. By seventeen, she had broken as many hearts as most other women would in a lifetime. Freshman year in high school, she was already dating a senior. When he drowned that summer in Louis Bay, rumor had it she didn’t even bat an eye. By junior year, she was dating a linebacker on the Boston College football team. He would drive in every weekend from Chestnut Hill just to see her. When she dumped him, he was so distraught he quit the team. And when he found out she had a new boyfriend, the poor bastard quit life too.

And at that moment, her beefhead boyfriend-of-the-moment was banging on his beat-up car, hard. “Come on babe, enough with the hysterics, alright?” 

She responded with a raised middle finger, “Get lost, mouthbreather.”

This statement caused Beefhead to turn bright red in what looked amusingly like constipated fury. It was then that he seemed to notice Mike for the first time. “Who’s the river rat?”

“Or you could stay here?” She stared at Mike with an  _Are you stupid, he could definitely kill you_  look on her face, and that was all he needed to snap to. He threw the engine in reverse and gunned the pedal, leaving Beefhead to yell after them impotently in the wake of smog.   

****

They drove in silence for a long time, Mike stealing nervous glances at her every now and then.  _Of all the cars in all the towns in all the world, she had to slide into mine._

“What?”

“Huh?” Mike startled.  _Shit, focus Mike. Now is not the time to start thinking about Casafuckingblanca._

“You keep looking over at me.”

He felt his face flush _._ She had noticed. “Oh. I, um, it’s just that…” He hesitated. “…Are you okay?” Truth be told, she didn’t look too great. Of course, she was a still complete babe, but her make-up was smudged and her eyes were puffy. She looked like she’d been crying.

“Oh,” she seemed to notice the mascara-stained tear streaks on her face for the first time, and reached up a hand to wipe them away, “It’s nothing.” They lapsed back into an awkward silence.

"Want one?" There was a cigarette in her hand. 

“No thanks. I have asthma.” 

“That blows,” she replied absently, her gaze drifting back to the window. Mike thought there were tears on her face again.

“You know…” Mike searched for the words to say something comforting and reassuring, something in him already wanting to protect her. What he actually managed was, “He looked like a real asshole.”   

She didn’t say anything, didn’t even look at him.  _Real eloquent, Wheeler._  He felt like kicking himself. She was probably in love with the guy and here he was, insulting her boyfriend -

She laughed. “Yeah. He is.” Their eyes met and she smiled at him then, and Mike swore it was the best goddamn sight in the world. 

“I see my house. You should stop here.”

They were still a good 100 yards from the first house. He looked around skeptically. “You sure?”

“Yeah. You don’t wanna get too close.”

Complying, Mike pulled over. His past experience with girls dictated that they would immediately jump out the car, eager to get away from him after he’d done whatever favor they’d wanted from him. But she didn’t move.

Mike looked at the house that lay ahead. A corroded station wagon was perched outside on cinder blocks in the untamed yard, overgrown with weeds. Cracks ran along the sides of the exterior walls and inside, there was only darkness. Staring at the house in front of her, unmoving, as if she didn’t want to go at all, she looked as raw and vulnerable as an open wound.  

“Thank you for the ride.”

“Yeah. Of course. Any time.” 

As she reached for the door handle, her eyes lingered on his. “What’s your name?” 

“Mike.” He thought of King Steve, with his shiny red Camaro and his endless bevy of hot chicks. “But people call me Mikey.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Why Mikey?”

“’Cause…it’s cool,” he said, suddenly feeling entirely uncool.   

There was an amused look on her face, and something else he couldn't quite identify. “Goodnight Mike.”

And with that, she walked away, the slight figure of her body receding from his headlights into the darkness.   

“Hey!” He’d almost forgotten. How dumb could he be? “What’s  _your_  name?”

She didn’t stop walking, but she looked back over her shoulder at him. “El.” 

L? “Wait – like, like the letter?” But this time, she didn’t turn back around. Mike watched her walk away, taking a long and steady pull from his inhaler.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed the last scene a bit. I wanted it to be a call back to El and Mike's first scene where they exchanged names. El only replies with, "Goodnight Mike."


	3. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Steve…th-thanks.” They were both still surging with adrenaline and fear. Mike felt like throwing up. But he managed a small smile, sincerely grateful. No one had ever had his back like that before. 
> 
> Steve met his eyes. Mike steeled himself for Steve to shout, to tell him what a stupid fucking kid he was, to kick him out the business. Instead, Steve returned his smile. “Family. That’s all I got. That’s what I worry about.” 
> 
> Family. Mike thought about losing his dad, and about meeting Steve. “Family,” he repeated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: Joe Keery's girlfriend, Maika Monroe (who plays El's character in the movie) briefly dated Timothee Chalamet (who plays Mike's character in the movie)

After dropping L off, Mike had laid in bed for hours, wide-awake. He couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t stop thinking about her long enough to.

At about 3am, he figured he might as well stop by Steve’s. Mike had scored another invitation to a party that he had had to forgo because he just couldn’t miss the _Terminator 2_ opening. Still, it seemed that his attempt to kill himself by inhaling the entire bong last time had somehow actually impressed Steve, despite the fact that Mike later puked all over his bathroom floor.

The party was winding down when he arrived, but Steve offered him a Budweiser and a joint, and several hours later, after the last of the guests had gone home, Mike was still sitting on Steve’s couch, watching him count out fat wads of cash.

“You ever worry you’ll get caught?”

“What?” Steve looked surprised, as if no one had ever thought to ask him that before.

“Selling weed. You ever worried you’ll get caught?”  

Steve paused, seeming to think on something. “You know that our whole galaxy – Orion’s belt and the Milky Way and all that shit….you know that in the grand scheme of things, our world and everything in it is basically a grain of sand on some beach? I learned that on a school trip in the fourth grade.” He took a long drag off his joint. “That’s when I stopped giving a shit. Walk on the edge long enough and you’re gonna fall. Trick is to enjoy the view first.”

Mike took in the meaning of his words, quiet. He wanted to consider his next words carefully, “What would you say if….if I told you I wanted to start selling weed?”

Steve laughed. Mike didn’t. “You’re serious.”

He nodded. “Fuck yes I am.”

“You’re a good kid, Mikey,” Steve sighed. “This shit isn’t for you. You’ve got things going for you.”

“Like what? College?” he scoffed. “That’s me doing what I’m supposed to. Life’s too short.”

“Which is why you shouldn’t fuck yours up."  

He couldn’t believe he was getting the Mom routine from King Steve. “I’ve got my reasons, man.”  Mike averted his eyes. He could feel his face start to flush. “I met this girl.” 

“Oh, here we go. There it is.”

A dopey grin spread across Mike’s face. Steve couldn’t tell if the kid was high or in love. “Yeah…I drove her home last night,” Mike took a slow puff off his joint, enjoying the memory. “I just…I just can’t get her out of my mind.” 

“So, this chick have a name?”

“I don’t even know man...All she told me was like, the first letter. L. Maybe she was trying to be cute or mysterious or something, I don’t know.”

“El?” There was only one girl named “El” in all of Hawkins. It wasn’t exactly a name you found under Most Popular Girl Names in the _Parenting Digest_. And to make matters worse, it was clear now that the kid’s dopey ass grin wasn’t just from the weed. Little Mikey was lovesick as shit.

“Yeah, L. Do you think it’s like, Laura or Lisa or –”

“Ah, shit.”

Mike smirked, not catching on. “Uh oh.…what, did you already bang her? Does she like, not like guys or something?”

“Not the letter ‘L’, dumbass. E.L. As in El. As in El Hopper. Daughter of Hawkins’ Chief of Police, Jim Hopper.”

 _Damn._ Mike struggled to process the thought; admittedly, he was high as fuck. He had the vague sense that this wasn’t good, considering how Steve made most of his money. “Well…” _Still, maybe…?_ “Do you think it’d be okay if I –” 

The kid was unbelievable. “No!” Steve looked at him like he was the biggest goddamn idiot on Earth. “Just leave her alone, period.”

“Okay…” It was the most half-assed _okay_ Steve had ever heard.    

“Okay? No. No _okay_. Stay away from her, or we could both get in some deep shit.” Then, for good measure, he added, “I’m not fucking around, Wheeler.” 

Mike at least made an effort to sound convincing this time. “Yeah no, I get it, Steve. I get it.” He looked like a schoolboy promising to never cheat on his exams again. “Forget it.” He corrected himself, “Forget her.”

Satisfied, Steve turned back to his last stack of cash.

 _“…_ but I still want a piece of your action.” Steve looked at him. The dopey look was gone. The kid was dead serious.  

“What for?”   

Mike grinned. “I wanna enjoy the goddamn view.”

_****_

“So, what’s the standard pricing?” Mike asked. He and Steve stood over several bags of weed spread across Steve’s kitchen counter. This was Lesson 1.

“A gram goes for 10 bucks. We call it a dime bag.” Steve held up a tiny Ziploc bag that was less than the size of his palm.

“That’s what we smoked at the party.”

“Good, I’m working with a natural,” Steve held up a larger bag. “This is an eighth. 3.5 grams. It’s 30 or 40 depending on how good the bud is. Most people want to buy these.”

“And what about this bad boy?” Mike pointed to a gallon-sized Ziploc.

“That’s a zip. It’s an ounce, so it’s 200 bucks give or take,” Steve lifted an eyebrow. “If more people bought these, my life would be a lot fucking easier.”

Mike smirked, “Well, we should sell more of those.”   

“Yes we should, smartass. But we can’t make people buy what they don’t want.”

“Then how can we make them want it?”

Steve looked up at Mike, his mouth curving into a smile, “You’re a smart little fuck, you know that? You’re too smart for your own fucking good.”

And that’s how it started. Over the next month, they sold all up and down Hawkins and five towns over. If you were getting stoned in lower Cape Cod that summer, you were getting it from Steve Harrington and Mike Wheeler.   

_****_

Mike was almost home when he saw the sirens in his rearview mirror. He had been making drop-offs going on four hours, blowing through his gas bill across Yarmouth, Brewster, and Chatham, delivering weed to bored teens, drunk meatheads, and once, to his surprise, a cute little old lady.

Steve had stressed to him the importance of minding his surroundings, and not acting like an idiot.

“You keep your headlights on, and drive slow,” he had instructed, like a concerned mother, “But not too slow!”

Mike had rolled his eyes and nodded absently, pulling out of Steve’s driveway with two pounds of weed in the trunk of his car. Now, as he stared at the fast-approaching red-and-blue lights, he wished he had paid better attention to Steve’s warnings.

“Shit,” Mike gripped the steering wheel hard, a hot swell of fear rising in his chest. He pulled the car slowly to a stop on the side of the road, and cut the radio.

“It’s okay, just be cool, just be cool,” he said to his reflection in the mirror, trying not to picture himself in a bright orange jumpsuit, getting jumped by skinheads behind bars.   

The cop took his sweet time getting out the patrol car, stopping to stretch before ambling up to Mike’s beat-up old Camry. He looked about middle-aged, with the frame of a man who might’ve been ripped in his prime but had since gone to seed. Reflective aviator sunglasses obscured his eyes, so that all Mike saw when the cop bent down to eye level was his own terror-stricken face reflected back at him. 

“Afternoon, offi-”

“License and registration.”

Mike didn’t need to be asked twice. He popped open the glove box, grateful that he at least wasn’t stupid enough to leave any weed in there, and handed over the papers dutifully.

“You’re new out this way.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yes, Sir.”

“It happens every summer.”

“What?” Mike squinted at the guy, confused. The sun refracted off his sunglasses, shining directly into Mike’s eyes.

“The air gets so heavy you can’t breathe,” he continued as if Mike hadn’t said anything, “the nights turn long and sleepless... you long for cooler times. You know what that is?”

 _Is this guy fucking crazy?_ Mike gulped, “N-no, sir.” He thought about the 2 pounds of weed in his trunk. Felony possession, minimum eight years.

“It’s gonna tear you apart,” and then he grinned at him. “See you farther down the road,” he drawled, glancing down at Mike’s license, “Michael Wheeler.”

And with that, he walked away, no ticket, no nothing, his bulky figure receding back to the patrol car. _Yeah, the guy was definitely fucking crazy._

****

“Sounds like Hopper.”

Mike nearly spit out his soda. He had been at this beach party with Steve all afternoon and the heat of the sun was starting to get to him. They were getting drinks at the snack bar when he started to tell Steve about the events of his most recent drug-run. “That was Hopper?” _Jesus fucking Christ. I was almost charged with intent to distribute by my dream girl’s dad._ “You gotta be fucking kidding me. How small _is_ this town?”

“I told you, Mikey, didn’t I?” Steve was annoyingly unperturbed, his gaze following some blonde in a two-piece up the boardwalk. “Yep, he’s the sheriff of this little waterin’ hole. And that’s his game – putting the fear of God in anyone who’ll let him.”

“Yeah, well he sure as shit put it in me!”

“Hey, take it easy,” Steve held his beer up to Mike, “Here, take a swig. And lower your goddamn voice.”

Mike turned red; he wasn’t sure if it was from embarrassment or stress. Maybe Steve’s small-town Pablo Escobar ass wasn’t worried, but Mike had never had so much as a parking ticket, and he sure as shit wasn’t going to do eight years just for being some glorified pot delivery boy.

“I’m telling you, right now, the risk versus reward is all fucked.”

“Listen, you’re taking this a little too serious, Mikey,” Steve gave him a light pat on the back, “Calm down. He’s been on my back for fuck knows how long now and I’m still here.”

“You don’t get what I’m saying.” Mike stopped walking and Steve almost plowed into him. “We have a choice and we have to choose.” He had that dead serious look in his eye again, same as the day he had insisted Steve induct him into the business. “You wanna be the guy who’s selling sodas over there or you wanna be the guy who owns the soda company?”  

****

“What’re we doing here?” Steve pulled up outside a poorly lit, dingy looking town-house. His shiny red Camaro, freshly done up from a recent wax job, stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the rest of the neighborhood, which could be described as, let’s just say, _colorful_.

“What do we have now, twenty-five customers? Maybe thirty? Altogether about a pound a week, right?” Mike glanced over at Steve, who at the moment looked like he’d rather be at home watching an anti-drug after-school special than be sitting in his car with Mike right now.  

“That’s good fucking money.” 

“It’s great money,” Mike agreed, “But the problem is, we’re dealing dimebags. Teenagers. We need customers who buy in bulk. We could move five, maybe ten times as much and cut out all the nonsense.”

“Unbefuckinglievable,” Steve scoffed, looking more surprised than angry. Mike wondered if he had ever considered that he could do more, _make_ way more than he did in all the years he had been dealing. Probably not.

“You know, three weeks ago,” Steve continued, “You didn’t know how to use a fucking bong, now you’re trying to tell _me_ how to flip weed?”

 _Ouch._ Mike felt a pang of embarrassment when he thought back to that first party, how he’d basically fainted after his first bong hit. It seemed like a long time ago. Far from the wheezing kid who didn’t know how to inhale, Mike was now essentially Steve’s business partner in everything but name. He’d gone from delivery boy to co-distributor, helping Steve acquire, collect, and dispense, and he knew that since he’d enter the picture, business (and money) had nearly quadrupled. If he was being honest with himself, Mike was feeling a sense of bravado that he’d never experienced before. That he never had a reason to experience before, until now. “Have I disappointed you yet?”  

Steve sighed. It was obvious Mike wasn’t gonna let this go. “Look. The problem isn’t with demand. It’s with the supplier. By the time it gets to us, it’s already been through a loud of hands - everyone’s already taken their cut. We would need to find someone who can move heavy weight. And one of _those_ big-time motherfuckers is not gonna want to deal with two fucking kids.”

Mike smirked, “We’ll see.” He moved to get out of the Camaro and saw Steve do the same. “No, no, stay here. This guy said he’d only talk to me so-”

“Are you gonna tell me what the fuck you’re gonna do? Who you’re lookin’ for?”

“The big-time motherfucker,” He laughed, but caught the tense look on Steve’s face. “It’s cool. Don’t worry." 

Steve lit a cigarette, his hands slightly tremoring, “I’m not worried. Just don’t be too long, asshole.”

“Yeah, you’re not worried, you’re not worried,” Mike muttered, rolling his eyes. Steve was nervous as fuck. In a sense, it was kind of touching. They had grown pretty close over the past month, bonding over weed-fueled debates on the merits of _Star Wars_ versus _Star Trek_ and the state of their ever-expanding business profits. With one last look back at the car, Mike pulled his best Schwarzenegger, “I’ll be back.” 

****

The smoke hit his face as soon as Mike entered the place. At first, there was so much of it, he seriously wondered if the house wasn’t on fire. It wasn’t just weed either, there were other chemical-tinged smells wafting around that Mike didn’t recognize, that made his lungs start to burn inside his chest. He resisted the urge to reflexively reach for his inhaler. _No. Don’t need it. That was the old Mike Wheeler._  

By now, Mike had been to a couple of house parties, mostly Steve’s. Being that Steve threw them, they were primarily populated by rich, young, White summer birds with way too much time, privilege, and disposable income on their hands. The people at this party…were different. For one, they looked like they were card-carrying members of Coked Out Creeps Anonymous, instead of the College Republicans club. And they were older and… _seedier_ , too. Mike noticed more than a few piles of white powder just sitting on various surfaces, with various colorful pills scattered around to boot.

He moved through the house mostly unnoticed; everyone else in the place seemed lethargic as fuck, and definitely no one seemed sober. All his cousin Dustin had told him was to look for a guy with a ponytail, and that the guy knew to expect him. _Don’t worry, Mike,_ he thought to himself, trying to feel as reassured as he did in the Camaro, _Dustin said this guy was cool. It’s gonna work. It’s got to work._

After a few more minutes of meandering around, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible although Mike looked way too young and way too _healthy_ to really blend in, he finally spotted the guy he was looking for, cornering some poor girl at the back of the kitchen.

Mike approached Ponytail from behind, feeling a bit unsure of himself. The guy hadn’t noticed him, intent as he was on whatever he was saying to that girl. Mike awkwardly cleared his throat. Nothing. He tried again, attempting an equally awkward, “Um, hey…” but his voice was swallowed up by Van Halen, obnoxiously blasting from the speakers. Finally, he decided to just tap the guy on the shoulder.

Big mistake.

Ponytail jumped as if he’d just heard a shot-gun go off by his ear, spinning around on Mike with a wild look and blood-shot eyes. The guy was coked out of his mind. 

“Shit!” He practically screamed. Mike jumped, too, beginning to feel the first inklings of regret. Maybe this _had_ been a bad idea… But it was too late to leave unnoticed, now. Ponytail scanned Mike up and down, “You can’t just be sneakin’ up on people, little man.”

Mike tried to play it cool, like he’d done this a million times before, “Sorry.. I heard-I heard you had weed.”

“Yeah, there’s weed all over the place, man,” Ponytail made a dismissive hand gesture, shooing Mike away.

“No, no I mean, like tons of weed. I’m looking to buy, like, _pounds_ of it.” Mike sensed that he’d said something very wrong as soon the words left his mouth. Ponytail’s eyes narrowed and then shifted around the room. Pure paranoia. He grabbed Mike by the arm, practically dragging him towards a secluded hallway.

“Who are you?”

“I, uh, Mikey. Dustin’s cousin,” Mike tried to ignore the growing sense of panic in the pit of his stomach. This wasn’t going how he had pictured. “D-didn’t he tell you I was coming –”

“You a cop?” The guy had Mike backed up against the wall now, jabbing at him with a meaty hand every time Mike tried to move away. “You a narc?”

“No, no, not a narc! I’m cool, I’m cool,” he placed his hands up defensively, feeling like a 12-year-old loser again who was about to get his face punched in. He felt a stab of very real regret for telling Steve to stay in the Camaro, which was very, very far away from where he was now. _Fuck me, Steve’s gonna come in and find me murdered._

“I’m a little high so let me get this straight…you come to my place, I don’t know who you are, you don’t know who I am, and you ask me to sell you _pounds_ of drugs?” _Fuck._ This was headed south, and fast.

“O-okay, sorry, I’m gonna go –” This time, Mike tried to more forcefully push his way past Ponytail, only to be met with the business end of a .42 glock pointed straight at his face. Mike’s stomach dropped to the floor. This was what he got, thinking he was the next Tony Montana or some shit, and now he was going to pay for it with his life.  

“You tell your little fucking cousin –” Ponytail broke off mid-sentence. A glass bottle suddenly broke over his head, knocking him to the ground. Before Mike could react or process what was happening, Steve was on the guy, clubbing Ponytail over and over again with the guy’s own glock, until Ponytail was limp and unmoving, his face a mess of blood.

“Steve –”

Steve looked up to see Mikey’s ashen face staring down at him. The kid was absolutely fucking petrified. “Let’s go.”

Mike didn’t need to be told twice. He followed after Steve, staggering out the door.

****

They sat in Steve’s driveway for a long time, after. Mike touched at something wet on his face, and his hand came away red with blood. It wasn’t his. Steve was breathing hard next to him, the rate of his breath matching Mike’s own still-rapid heartbeat. Steve still had Ponytail’s glock wrapped tightly in his hand, which was covered in blood.  

“Steve…th-thanks.” They were both still surging with adrenaline and fear. Mike felt like throwing up. But he managed a small smile, sincerely grateful. No one had ever had his back like that before.

Steve met his eyes. Mike steeled himself for Steve to shout, to tell him what a stupid fucking kid he was, to kick him out the business. Instead, Steve returned his smile. “Family. That’s all I got. _That’s_ what I worry about.”  

Family. Mike thought about losing his dad, and about meeting Steve. “Family,” he repeated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More mileven in the next chapter. Promise. 
> 
> I appreciate kudos and/or comments. Thanks for reading this far!


	4. Lollipop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So uh, this took me awhile to update. Sometimes it be like that. 
> 
> This chapter is pretty short, but I got some renewed inspiration and figured something was better nothing. And even though this is short, it's got more mileven content than all previous chapters combined. It's high concentrate mileven, so enjoy!

The next time he saw El Hopper, it was a Friday. The Hubble Telescope had launched that day, and The Silence of the Lambs had premiered in theaters. Mike Wheeler spent the afternoon browsing the first aid section of the local Degman’s – Hawkins’ knock-off version of Wegman’s – sucking on a lollipop and hoping to find something ( _Band-aids? Some gauze? A cream?)_ for the cut that beer bottle glass had left on his cheek.

Finally, he shrugged, grabbing a box of each. He didn’t have time to figure this out. He still had a couple more drop-offs to make this afternoon and he wanted to make them all before Steve’s kegger tonight.  

He whipped around to head for the cashiers, and ran straight into her. 

She had her back to him, browsing the frozen section. She hadn’t noticed him at all.

Mike gulped.  

He wanted to talk to her, but what was he going to do? Like, just _approach_ her? Yeah, right. 

What to do, what to do. The familiar spike of anxiety tugged at his stomach as he scanned their surroundings, desperate for a way to get her attention, without actually having to, you know, _get her attention._ Finally, in desperation, he reached out, smacking a couple of boxes of cereal over, sending them all scattering loudly to the floor. _I’m a dumbass, a total dumbass._

It worked though.

“Mike?” El squinted at him, looking first at him and then at the boxes of cereal on the floor in confusion.

“What? Hi.” _Real casual, Wheeler._

For a moment, she looked startled. Then she gestured at his cheek, pretending that he hadn’t just knocked over a bunch of cereal to get her attention. “Wow. What happened there?”

“Oh this? Just a fight.” _No biggie. Nope, I’m a real tough guy. Not like I actually nearly got my ass murdered._

“Naughty,” she smirked. “Guess I should see the other guy.”

Mike chuckled nervously, “Yeah….totally.” _Shit, what now?_ In his mind, he had only thought as far as getting her attention. He didn’t actually know what to do once he actually got it. The moment lapsed into awkward silence, Mike playing absently with the lollipop and staring down pathetically at his dirty Converses.

“So how long have you been following me for?”

“What?” His head snapped up. He hadn’t been following her, but now it just sounded like he _had_ and maybe he should have just started out by saying _no_ – “Following – what? Following you?” _Oh my God, Wheeler, now you definitely sound like you’ve been following her._

El didn’t say anything. Instead, she took a step towards him. And then another one. And another one. 

_Oh fuck._

And then she was right in front of him, so close he could smell her sunscreen, could practically reach out and touch her and taste that bubblegum pink gloss on her lips –

“Have you ever had an Eggo Triple Decker Extravaganza?”

Mike swallowed. Hard. “N-no.”

“It’s pretty cool.”

Did she know how close she was to him? He could feel the heat radiating off her, or was it the weather? Mike didn’t know, but ironically he was frozen. Somehow terribly excited and frightened as fuck at the same time.

“But I can’t find any.”

“Extravanganza?” He asked, dumbly. The lollipop hung out of the corner of his mouth, forgotten.

“No. Eggos.” El was smirking again, and all Mike could focus on was the heart-shaped curve of her lips. And then she was reaching forward, pulling the lollipop from his mouth and putting it into hers.  

She gave it one hard suck, never breaking their eye contact.

“Oh….. _fuck_.” He wasn’t sure if he had said that out loud or in his own head.

“Tastes good, but it’s a little too sweet for me,” she said, placing the lollipop back into his mouth.

She was right. It did taste sweeter this time.

Without thinking he swallowed. It tasted like El.

El licked her lips, and all Mike could do was blink. What the fuck was he supposed to do now? What the fuck had just happened? Did that meant she liked him? Should he ask her out now? Should he kiss her? Did she want him to? Did she –

“Hey, El! Dan’s waiting, come on!”

And just like that, the moment was over.

“Coming Jenny!” Jennifer Hayes and that whole crew were waiting for her outside. Of course. Mike could hear Jennifer’s meathead boyfriend Danny Hatfield blasting on the horn obnoxiously. “Well, I gotta split,” El said, already walking away. 

“Uh – hey,” One last ditch effort. She couldn’t just _leave._ Not like that. He had to see her again. “You gonna go to the fireworks on Friday?”

El didn’t stop, but she did look at him over her shoulder, “Maybe,” she said. Her smile was cryptic. She was driving him crazy.

_Maybe._

And somehow the maybe excited him more than even a yes. It was a challenge, one that the old Mike Wheeler would’ve accepted as defeat. But hey, he was King Steve’s right-hand man now, wasn’t he? He wasn’t the old Mike Wheeler anymore.

“Maybe we’ll share another lollipop?”

El responded with only a smirk. Then she was out the door, gone.

Mike dragged the lollipop out of his mouth, enjoying the taste in a new way.

A smirk. It wasn’t a yes. But it wasn’t a no. Either way, there’d be fireworks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to go in a new direction with this fic. Less drug stuff, more mileven. Next chapter, fireworks! (And no pesky Mindflayer business to spoil it unlike canon ;)


	5. It Was All Fireworks

Fourth of July. It was the talk of the town. The county fair was putting on a big fireworks show, and it seemed like everyone in this little bumfuck tourist town was gonna be there. Including Mike Wheeler.

Especially Mike Wheeler.

He pulled up to the dinky little parking lot in a brand new, sleek black ’91 Corvette.

“The man I work for, who you will never meet, will provide as much product as you can handle.”

He and Steve had finally found that big-time motherfucker. And they were moving more weight than even Steve had ever seen.

“Not a problem,” Mike had insisted, despite Steve’s objections. “But say something happens. Say we’re a little late. What happens then?”

The big-time motherfucker had only shrugged. “You’ve seen the movies.”

Yeah, Mike had seen the movies. The Godfather, Scarface, Goodfellas. Sure, they had all ended in a lot of violent deaths, but there had also been a lot of money, a lot of fancy cars, and a lot of hot chicks. Mike Wheeler, former Star Wars nerd, now had plenty of two out of three. All he still needed was the hot chick. And if El was going to be here tonight, well, he’d figured he’d have all three, soon enough.

Or at least, he hoped so.

Because he wasn’t that Star Wars nerd anymore. He had money, he had a nice car, and he had brokered deals with dangerous drug dealers and come out winning. Hell, he _was_ the dangerous drug dealer, now, wasn’t he? This would be a piece of cake.

It had to be.

She was at one of the gaming booths, the one where you try to shoot plastic fish in a barrel for a giant teddy bear.

“I’m gonna go grab some more booze from the Beemer,” Brad Rothschild was saying, finally unhooking his arm from around her waist as El yawned. “You ladies have any requests?”

“Something strong,” El said. She was mocking him, but he was too dumb to notice.

“You little devil,” Brad grinned, going in for a kiss that El turned into a peck on the cheek, turning her head at the last minute.

She watched him put his buddy into a headlock as they walked away for more beers, rolling her eyes. It was the same thing every year in this shit town. Fourth of July. Fireworks. Meatheads. Big fucking deal.

“He’s fuckin’ wicked hot, El,” Jennifer was saying, “Not to mention, like, rich as fucking God.”

“He’s okay,” El said simply.

“You always do this,” Jennifer scoffed. “You wouldn’t know Prince Charming if he came in your mouth.”

El made a face. What was wrong with this chick? “That’s gross, Jennifer.”

Jennifer shrugged, “I’m just saying.” Suddenly, though, she was nudging at El. “Oh my God….what is this geek about to do?”

El followed her gaze and saw Mike Wheeler approaching, a determined but otherwise unreadable expression on his face. He had something behind his back, hidden in his hands.

“Hey,” he said simply, ignoring Jennifer and Abby beside her, his eyes on El and only El.

“Hey yourself.” She was going to keep it cool. He was just a summer bird, after all. Interested in her for the summer and then packing up once the weather cooled to go on with the rest of his life. That was how it always was.

“I was hoping you’d show up.”

“Guess who got lucky,” she said, the corner of her lips quirking into a small smile. Teasing.

“I brought you something.”

El resisted the temptation to roll her eyes again. Not like she hadn’t heard that line before. It was probably beer. Something cheap and nasty, just to get her drunk, to get her stupid enough to do what he wanted her to. El knew the routine.

Instead he handed her a box of Eggos.

He had remembered. Their stupid little conversation at Degman’s, how she had teased him and made a joke out of it, like he’d actually been paying attention to what she’d said instead of just focusing on what she’d done to that lollipop.

El couldn’t help it. She smiled. Just a little. Eggos were her favorite, after all. 

“I gave it a shot,” he said.

“Eggo Triple Decker Extravangaza?”

“Yeah,” he nodded, “You were right. It is awesome.”

“Well, don’t eat ‘em all at once,” El was still smiling, and now Mike was too.

“It’s too late for that,” he said. He wasn’t smiling anymore. He looked serious. “I’m….hooked.”

El didn’t say anything. She didn’t know _what_ to say. It was stupid. It was just like any other summer bird trying to get into her pants. Empty words and hollow declarations. Right?

Mike didn’t say anything either. Instead, he looked down at his shoes, a smile slowly spreading across his face again. As if he’d been afraid to say what he’d just said, but glad to have done so anyway. His eyes met hers and then he was turning to walk away, a cryptic smile on his face, and it was El’s turn this time to watch him go with a mixture of feelings. Excitement and fear. Hope and caution.

He’d done it.

Mike couldn’t stop smiling as he walked away. He’d come here to do what he just did, and he was proud of himself. More than proud. The way El had looked at him, the way she had smiled at him…he felt happy. Like, a stupid amount of happy. Like all the cheesy things he had heard about but never experienced before. He felt warm all over, and his heart felt full, almost like fit to _bursting_ and – and his lungs felt tight, and it was starting to feel hard to breathe and _shit_ , he needed his inhaler, where was his inhaler?

Mike was brought quickly back down to Earth. Still the nerd with asthma. He found the inhaler in his back pocket and brought it to his lips, read to inhale…..except he didn’t.

No.

That was the old Mike Wheeler. It wasn’t who he was anymore.

He didn’t want to suck on his inhaler in the middle of the county fair like a fucking loser. He wanted to kiss El. Wanted to hold her and kiss her and feel her kiss him back in front of her dumb friends and everyone in Hawkins. He wanted to make her see real fireworks tonight.

_Fuck it._

Mike threw his inhaler in the trash. Then he turned back around.

He saw that Brad and his bros had returned, but that didn’t slow him down. Within seconds he was back at the fishing booth, striding up to her with purpose in his eyes, pulling her into him before Brad and his douchebag friends even knew what was happening. 

And then he was kissing her. She tasted like bubblegum lip gloss and strawberries, just like he’d always imagined. At first she stiffened in surprise, but then he felt her relax in his arms, her lips sliding open against his and she was kissing him back, she was _kissing him back,_ all soft and pliable and warm against him and –

Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Someone pushed him off of El.

All he saw was the fist coming at his face. Then it was all fireworks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: hot summer nights is available for free if you've got amazon prime


	6. Hot Summer Nights

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoooo boy, okay. Those of you who kept asking for more mileven will (hopefully) be very pleased with this chapter (but the rating's not going up, sorry folks).

July 1991 would be the best month of Mike Wheeler’s life. The long summer days were spent on their ever-expanding business. They were moving more weight now than they ever had before, and the cash was rolling in, so much so that Mike didn’t even know how to spend it all anymore, or even where to put it. He’d put a solid 40K down _in cash_ for his new Corvette and he _still_ had so much left over he was beginning to run out of places to hide it.

It felt good though.

For the first time in his life, Mike Wheeler felt alive. Like he was Michael Fucking Corleone. Like he was finally _somebody_. Like he actually fucking _mattered._

And the hot summer nights? Those he spent with El Hopper.

Late night fries at the diner. Double features at the drive-in. Making out in the backseat afterwards.

One time they had snuck into the local dive-bar after closing.

“My older sister used to work here,” she’d said. “I kept a copy of the keys.” A wink. Her hand in his as the door popped open. Wrapping his arms around her as she led him into the dark.

They had taken (“Borrowed,” she’d said) a few bottles of Jack. Emptied them in the back of his Corvette. Drunkenly dancing in the parking lot. Holding her close. Kissing until they were both panting and sticky from the heat that wasn’t just from the weather.  

July 1991 was the best month of Mike Wheeler’s life.

“I love how it gets after a storm,” El said. They were at the drive-in again. It was something they both loved to do. To Mike’s pleasant surprise, El had turned out to be as much of a movie geek as he was. Well, not a geek. More like a movie buff. She got all of his lame references at least, and made a few obscure ones of her own. Mike thought he loved…..Mike thought he _liked_ that about her. A lot.  

“The air’s so light,” she continued, “I feel like I could float.” Then, giggling, “Or maybe I’m just kinda drunk.”

“You’re cute when you’re kinda drunk,” he said, playfully. “You know….I could get us more drinks if you want….and weed too. A bunch of it.” His tone had shifted. Tentative. He thought this might impress her but he wanted to kick himself when her smile faded instead. Shit. Had he said the wrong thing?

“What is it?”

El shook her head. “You’re not….caught up in anything shady, are you?”

“What?” Mike felt his heart drop a little, feeling like a little kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He should have known someone like El wouldn’t be impressed with the dumb shit he and Steve were up to. “Shady stuff – what does that – you think I would –” He was babbling. He’d always been bad at lying.

She shut him up with a light smack on the cheek. Playful. But the look in her eyes persisted. She wanted to know.

“I’m not,” he lied.

“Promise?” There was a look in her eyes. She wanted to believe him.  

“Promise.” Mike said, with more confidence than he thought he was capable of. He felt awful for lying to El but…maybe now just wasn’t the time. They were just starting out and he didn’t want to do anything that could scare her away, jeopardize it…he _would_ tell her. In a few more months maybe, when she got to know him better, and she would understand, maybe even _appreciate_ …but, just…not now.  

El nodded. She seemed satisfied. The moment lapsed into a tense silence.

“Do you know anything about my dad?” This time it was El who sounded tentative, unsure.

“Um…” _He’s the sheriff of this little waterin’ hole. And that’s his game – putting the fear of God in anyone who’ll let him._ “I-I’ve heard of him.”

El looked down at her lap. “He’s Hawkins’ Chief of Police.” She looked sad. “We don’t talk anymore. Not really.”

Mike didn’t say anything. He didn’t know _what_ to say. He had never been good with words. He wanted to touch her and hold her and wipe away the tears that he could see were already starting to form in her eyes, but he let her talk. It seemed like something she had been wanting to say for a long time.

“It was when my sister got really sick. Sarah. She was a couple years older than me.” El’s voice had gotten thick with sadness. “She um, she started dating this kid Steve Harrington.”

Mike gulped. _Shit, Steve._ Whatever El was about to say about Steve, it didn’t sound like it was going to be good. Was that why he had wanted Mike to stay away from her so bad? Not just because of Hopper but because of…whatever this was going to be?

“Maybe you’ve heard of him. He’s um, he’s real popular.” Mike tensed up again, preparing himself for another lie, but El wasn’t looking at him. She was gazing out the window, far away. “Anyway, he got her on stuff. Weed mostly, but um, but she started on other stuff after that, too. Coke, pills. Heroin. Just about anything you could get your hands on, really. She couldn’t stop. And then one day she um….” El trailed off. Mike could tell she was trying hard not to cry. “She overdosed. And my dad hasn’t been the same since. He just goes to work and comes home and spends all his money on booze and…and that’s all he does anymore.” El stopped, wiping away the tears on her face. “It’s like they’re both dead now.”

Mike felt crushed by the weight of his own guilt. He didn’t know, he couldn’t have known, but in that moment, he felt like a piece of shit. Lying to both Steve and El.

And he was trapped now. Lying to El about _everything._ About knowing Steve, about being a drug dealer when her own sister had fucking died of an overdose. Being in the weed business had made Mike feel high in every possible way, like he was on top of the world. Like he was finally a real man. But now he knew El would _never_ feel that way. El would only think of him as a piece of garbage, the same kind of person who had sold her sister drugs and killed her. She would _hate_ him, and Mike wouldn’t be able to stand it if that happened.

“I’m sorry” was all that he could say.

She shrugged in response. Her cheeks were still wet but the pained look in her eyes was gone, replaced by a façade of practiced numbness. “It is what it is.”

And then the waitress was tapping on the driver’s side window. “So, how will you be settling the bill tonight?”

Mike opened his wallet, trying to hide the wad of dirty drug money within, handling her two $20 bills. Completely crushed with guilt. “Cash.”

-

“Um…If I could be anything?” They were lying beneath the willow tree, half-eaten deli sandwiches and cans of Coke strewn about them on Mike’s fleece blanket. “Oh, I dunno, maybe Mick Jagger,” he said, laughing.  

“Mick Jagger?” El made a face. “You’d have to get lip injections first.”

“True,” he admitted. They both giggled. “…What about you? If you could be anything.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Come on, you _have_ to know.”

“It’s stupid.”

“No, it’s not.”

She raised an eyebrow, skeptical. “And how would you know?”

“Because you couldn’t say anything stupid, El. It’s not like….possible.” Mike’s voice teased, but he meant it.

“I, um…an artist. I like to draw.” She kept her eyes on their intertwined hands, her fingers playing absently with his own. “I never told anyone that before. Not really. No one’s ever asked.”

The admission sort of broke Mike’s heart. When he had first met El, all that he knew was that she was the hottest chick in town. Wanted by every guy, admired by every girl. But the truth was, they didn’t see her as a person. They saw her as an object. And she had gotten used to seeing herself that way, too.

It had made El Hopper hauntingly alone, and lonely.  

“I want to save to….to maybe go to art school, someday. Finally leave this fucking town.” El stopped playing with his fingers, retracting her hand. “But that’s stupid. It’s never going to happen.”

“How could you say that? Don’t say that.” Mike hated seeing the light die out of her eyes. Couldn’t she see what he so clearly did? “You’re smart, you’re kind, you could do anything you want to. The world is yours.” _I’m yours_ , he wanted to say.

“No I can’t.” Her voice was small. “No money. Can’t afford school. Dad spent it all trying to get Sarah sober and now he spends it all trying to keep himself from _being_ sober. I’m never getting out of this town.”

Mike thought of the business. He thought of the wads of cash he kept in his bedroom, threatening to overflow from the shoeboxes in his closet, from underneath his mattress, lining his dresser drawer. But he knew it still wouldn’t be enough to pay for all of school. A degree was expensive. He would need more. He would need to expand the business, but that wouldn’t be a big deal, right? Why not? He had already done it once before.

And that was when Mike Wheeler made the decision, there underneath the shade of the willow tree, lying next to El Hopper, that would seal all of their fates by summer’s end.   

“Look at me. If you want to be an artist, go to art school, get the fuck out of this town, then that’s what you’ll do. Promise.”

The determination in his voice made her smile, and as he leaned in to kiss her, it began to rain.

El gave a yelp, breaking the kiss. Lightning cracked overhead, followed by the sound of thunder. It began to pour.

“Come on!” Mike pulled her up and then they were running, the rain soaking through their clothes and splashing on their faces, and El was giggling and shrieking beside him every time the thunder clapped, holding onto him tightly. The world around them melted into a blur, and then somehow they were back in his car, a sudden respite from the wet and cold, the rain tapping gently against the Corvette’s roof.

It was quiet. Like every sound was muffled except for their own breaths.

She was on his lap. An unreadable expression on her face.

She kissed him. It was shy. Tentative. A question.  

“I, um…I’ve never….before.” He drifted off. They both knew what he meant.

“Me neither,” she said.

“Really?” Mike couldn’t conceal his surprise. Not that he thought El was easy. Only that he couldn’t believe that it was _him_ , that she would choose him. Two months ago he never would have thought that someone like El would even _look_ at someone like him, let alone…

“Yeah,” she said, nodding. A whisper. Soft and vulnerable. The steel exterior discarded. Her vulnerability washed over him.

He hooked a finger underneath her chin and brought her close. They kissed.

Outside, the rain poured down, obscuring everything in mid-day darkness.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sticking pretty faithfully with the plot of the movie so, what you think just happened, happened. Although, I do enjoy inserting callbacks to stranger things, like the "promise?" "promise" thing. They ARE still El and Mike in this AU, after all.


	7. K.O.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for it took me awhile to get this chapter out. Life got busy and this chapter is a longer one.

It was dark by the time they pulled up to El’s house. The rain had let up on the drive back, and it was only then that they realized how late it had actually gotten.

“I’m already past curfew,” El said, in between kisses. “I have to go, Mike.”

“Yeah, you have to go,” Mike agreed, pulling her in for more.

“I’m…going….” El wrapped her arms around his neck and deepened the kiss. “God, you feel so…”

“You have to go,” Mike said. He really had to get it together. El was already past curfew and if Hopper found out….

They broke apart, but Mike’s arm was still wrapped around her waist, his body not quite processing what his mind was telling him to do.

El gave him one last kiss, pressing up against him in a way that made him feel like they were still in the back seat of his car.

“Goodnight, Mike.”

And then, just like that, she was off, dashing out the car and sprinting down the street.

El had still insisted that he drop her off a few blocks from her actual house, and now that Mike knew she was _Chief Hopper’s daughter_ , he had been happy to oblige.

But she was late.

How could she have been so careless, forgetting about curfew like this?

They had gone out early in the day, and there had been plenty of time to get back before sunset, but well, they hadn’t planned for that storm…or for what happened during it….but it was too late now.

The memory made El flush, going warm all over despite the cool night air. It wasn’t something either of them had planned, but El didn’t regret it.

The only thing she regretted was not keeping track of curfew.

She raced down the street and soon came upon their messy, overgrown lawn.

-

_Vrooom!_ The sudden loud screech of a car engine revving and then speeding down the street.

Hop put down his beer.

He hadn’t seen El all day. He figured she was out with another boy. Not that she bothered to keep him up to date with her life anymore. Not since Sarah.

But El knew better than to miss curfew.

Perhaps he just hadn’t notice her come in.

He stared down at the empty beer bottle. One of many. The feeling of shame was almost negligible by now, but it came all the same.

It was very possible that he had simply been too drunk to notice.

He started down the hallway towards her bedroom. The light was on, which was good. She was probably home.

-

It was a mad dash up the neglected trellis to her bedroom window, and then she was in. She could hear his heavy footsteps thudding down the hall already.

Shit shit shit shit.

El was still in her picnic clothes, wet from the downpour. He’d definitely realize she’d just come in from the rain.

-  
Hop knocked on the door but there was no answer. In fact, he couldn’t hear any noise inside at all.

He sighed. Had she missed curfew after all?

He pushed the door in –

“Dad? Did you need something?”

And there she was, wrapped up in a large white bathrobe with her hair in a towel. She was looking at him like she had no idea what he wanted.

“You been in here all night?”

“Yes.” She said it like it was the most obvious statement in the world. “Where else would I be?”

-

“There’s this guy up in Portland.” Mike pushed his fries around the plate, glancing up nervously at Steve. He honestly didn’t know what Steve would make of this, but it was too late now. They were going to have the conversation, right there, in the diner. As good a place as any, he guessed. “He’s got good stuff, good prices. He says he wants to meet us.”

Steve hadn’t seen the kid in weeks. Mike had essentially taken over most of the business, dealing with the day-to-day shit, which was fine as far as Steve was concerned. The kid was good at the math, he was good at the business, and the more time he spent poring over the numbers, the more time Steve could spend on the important things that mattered. Like girls and parties.

Still, Mikey was naïve as shit, and he’d gotten them both in over their heads before.

So, when he had come to Steve with yet another business idea, Steve was, to say the very fucking least, extremely skeptical.

“What does Dex think about this?” Dex, otherwise known as the big-time motherfucker, was now their one and their _only_ weed supplier. They had a good thing going with Dex, and Steve wasn’t about to fuck that up.

There were going to be consequences other than lost revenue if they crossed Dex, and quite frankly, Steve wasn’t sure the kid had even considered that.

“Dex doesn’t know.”

Yep, the kid _definitely_ hadn’t considered it. “What?”

“Dex doesn’t know but….you know, it’s gonna be fine,” Mike insisted. It was going to be. It had to be.

“Alright. Am I missing something here?” What was the kid playing at? They were doing fine.

They were doing _way more_ than fine.

The whole thing had gone off without a hitch and it was quite frankly a fucking miracle, and Steve was more than happy with their business arrangements.

“We got the best weed hookup in the whole of the northeast, and….you wanna fuck it up. For what?”

“This guy….” Mike sighed. So he really had to spell it out for Steve, huh? “He’s not selling weed.”  
  
For a second Steve just stared at him, incredulous. “So…let me get this straight. You think you’re a cocaine dealer now?”

Mikey didn’t say anything except, “This is gonna be more money than either of us have ever seen.”

But Steve knew. He could see it in the kid’s eyes. “Is that _really_ what this all about?”

Mike thought about El. About art school. About Hopper drinking away their money and the haunted look in his dream girl’s eyes.

“Yeah,” he said. “What else would it be about?”

Steve shook his head. Mikey had turned out to be a good businessman but he was a shitty liar.

And he was still naïve as fuck.

“You don’t think any of this shit through, do you man? Cocaine?” It was a bridge too far for even Steve. Who did the kid think they were? Tony fucking Montana?

“Look,” Mikey sighed and ran a nervous hand through his hair, but when he looked up at Steve, he had that same determined look in his eyes that he did the day he had insisted on partnering up, and on the night he had gone off into that house party and nearly gotten them both killed.

There was no talking him out of it.

“All I’m saying is, how long do you wanna stay Dex’s errand boy? We’re not the only guys he sells to, why the fuck should he be the only one we’re allowed to buy it from?”

“Because that’s just how this shit works, Mikey. That’s how it’s _always_ worked.” This was stupid. “If Dex finds out, and he _will_ find out - look at me.”

It wasn’t just stupid. It was _suicidal_.

“Don’t come running to me.”

Steve thought about sitting in his empty car on that empty street, his fists tightening around the steering wheel, debating whether or not to go in after the kid. Mikey was taking too long, he had never even talked to a dealer outside of Steve, and there was just no way the kid wasn’t going to fuck it up. So Steve had thought _Fuck it_ and pushed the front door in, figuring potentially embarrassing the kid was better than potentially letting him die or having the cops running up on them.

And Steve had been right.

_His instincts_ had been right, and Mikey had been in trouble, and he had come in just in the nick of time to save his ass.

But the kid just didn’t know when to stop.

It was so clear now. Little Mikey had some kind of live fast and die young death wish, something stupid to prove that was going to get him killed, and he kept _pushing_ and _pushing_ , and there was only so much Steve could do to turn him away.

And now, he just couldn’t do it anymore.

Steve thought of Sarah.

He had always been lousy at saving people, anyway.

“Don’t come running to me,” he repeated.

For a long moment, Mike just sat there, taking in his words. Steve was washing his hands of this. Of Mike.

And that was fine. It was fine. He didn’t need him anyway.

After all, Steve had been a low-level dealer _for years_ before Mike came along, and if he wanted to stay that way forever, then that was fine with him. But Mike, and El, they were meant for bigger and better things than this. Better than a dead-end life selling dime bags to teenagers and tourists. Better than a dead-end life in Hawkins.

_Anyway, he got her on stuff._ “The things that people say about you….” _Weed mostly, but um, but she started on other stuff after that, too. Coke, pills._ “Any of that true?”

The look in Steve’s eyes told Mike all that he needed to know.

It was a low blow, but Mike didn’t care anymore.

Steve said nothing. He didn’t have to.

Mike nodded at him, threw some cash on the table, and left.

-

“I thought you said you were good at this. I’m destroying you!” Mike’s Ryu was in the midst of eviscerating El’s Chun-Li.

They had been at the arcade for a little over an hour, Mike suggesting it as a way to stay in-doors near a/c, and to his pleasant surprise, El hadn’t minded. She was actually pretty good at some of the games. But not Street Fighter.

He snaked his arm around her, squeezing her sides and tickling, using it as an excuse to both touch her and distract her from the game.

“Stop! That’s cheating!” She giggled and squirmed in his arms, but didn’t move away. “Not fair!”

Suddenly, the screen was screaming _K.O.! K.O!_ at them. Chun-Li had finally run out of health points. The screen flashed, “Play again? 20….19…..18….”

Mike patted at his pockets but they were empty. “Quick! Get more coins, hurry!”

El nodded, scurrying off to the change machine.

Mike turned back to the screen, but realized he had forgotten to ask if she had enough money for change. He was about to set off after her when –

“Mikey boy!”

Steve Harrington was grinning at him, a random blonde chick that Mike only vaguely thought he recognized hanging off his arm. “What’re you doing here? On your own you fucking loser?”

Steve gave him a good-natured slap on the shoulder. He was trying, Mike knew. He was really trying. Hoping to smooth things over, like it was before. And Mike wanted to return the gesture. Truth be told, he missed Steve. He missed his shitty jokes, he missed getting high as fuck with him, he missed the way it had been before. But he thought about El.

Now wasn’t a good time. Now _really_ wasn’t a good time.

Steve didn’t miss the kid’s uneasy smile. “You all right?”

Mike was about to reply with some bullshit, “Yeah of course,” when the words died on his lips as Steve’s smile slowly melted off his face, replaced by a stunned sort of expression. Mike turned to follow his gaze and found himself staring right at El.

Looking just as uncomfortable and dumbfounded as Steve, jingling the quarters nervously in her hands.

Fuck. This was not good.

“What are you….” Steve started, looking back and forth between Mike and El. He looked confused, and then suspicious. “You two know each other?”

This was _really_ not good.

Shit shit shit. What to say?

“No…no we haven’t met,” El said, saving Mike’s tongue-tied ass. Her eyes darted briefly to his.

But no, that wasn’t right either. They had met before, and Steve knew it.

“Um yeah, actually, there was one time I gave you a ride home.” Mike said, rubbing at the back of his head nervously. “But uh, you probably don’t remember.”

“I never knew you liked going to the arcade, El.”

“I don’t.” El shrugged. “Jenni forgot to give me a ride so…” She paused, looking down at the change in her hand. “I had to go get some quarters to call her to pick me up.”  
  
“Hop’s not home? I mean... is he doing okay?” It was as if Mike wasn’t even part of the conversation anymore. He and the blonde just sort of stood there, spectators to something that seemed uncomfortable and private.

Steve looked guilty as shit.

“Yeah,” El was doing her best to keep it cool. She was good at that, had always been good at that, but Mike could tell by now. When it was all just an act. “He’s fine.” Polite but curt. To the point.

But Steve didn’t take the hint.

“Listen El,” he sighed, brushing a shaky hand through his poofed-up hair, “I’m sorry for –”

“Wow, okay. You’re not doing this here.” El’s façade was finally gone. “I’m just gonna walk home.” She turned to Mike with a tight smile. “It was nice meeting you.”

And then she was gone.

-

Mike found her walking down Mulberry street all alone, still a long way from home. He slowed the corvette to a stop and popped the passenger door open, expecting her to slide in.

But she didn’t.

“How do you know Steve?”

He should have figured. El wasn’t stupid. Of course she was going to have questions.

_Maybe you’ve heard of him. He’s um, he’s real popular._

But Mike just wasn’t ready.

_He got her on stuff._

Not like this. Not now.

“I don’t really….I just met him at a party once.” Another lie. What was one more to add to the pile?

El’s eyes met his, and all her innocence shone through them.

She nodded.

She trusted him. She believed him.

It hit Mike like a punch in the stomach.

She slid in next to him, resting her head on his shoulder.

The corvette disappeared down the dark street, whisking them both away towards the end of summer.

 


	8. Fireflies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't a super long chapter, but honestly....I figure its better to just publish what I can manage to actually write rather than wait another 6 months while I work on a huge chapter. I try to end things at logical end/cut off points in the narrative though. And we're almost finished. This fic will _probably_ have about 12 chapters total.

“When Sarah and I were little, we used to catch them in those glass jars.”

El scooted closer, her head bumping gently against his. They were sprawled on the big flannel blanket Mike kept in the back of the Corvette, a galaxy of twinkling stars above them. Some of the lights seemed to move and dance, dimming in and out of the summer air. Not stars at all, but fireflies.

“She used to tell me it was magic.” El’s voice was filled with wonder and vulnerability, a side of herself that she only allowed in short gasps and glimpses. It felt private, and intimate, like she was trusting Mike with a part of her that no one else was allowed to see. “We’d put them in my room at night and they’d light up.”

He wanted to reach over and touch her, hold her close against him. “Why’d you stop catching them?” he asked instead.

And just like that, that El was gone again, like flame in the wind. “Kept dying,” she said, her voice even and nonchalant. The cool girl façade that was so well practiced. “Got depressing.”

“El – ” _You don’t have to be strong all the time. Not with me._ He wanted to say. He opened his mouth to say, but –

“Can you tell Steve something for me?”

“I- What?” Mike’s mouth opened and then shut again wordlessly. El knew? How? Was she mad at him? Was she going to dump him, like he always figured she would? Would this be the last time he ever saw her? “El, me and Steve –”

She didn’t let him finish. “Tell him….tell him I forgive him.” She looked over at him, and said it again. “I forgive him. Okay?”

He returned her gaze. Whatever, _however_ , she had figured it out, it clearly wasn’t important right now. All her baggage, her dead sister and her alcoholic father, King Steve. The significance of what she was saying hit him like a ton of bricks. She was forgiving Steve for it all. “Okay,” his voice came out in a whisper. “I’ll tell him.”

El looked away again, back up at the stars, at the fireflies dancing around them. She didn’t say anything for a long time. It felt like the longest moment in Mike Wheeler’s life.

“I’m not stupid, you know.”

“I’m sorry, El - I don’t think that, I - ”

“He’s like what – the guy that tells you about all the cool parties?” Her voice was light, and she was smiling at him. “I bet you even buy a little bit of weed from him, don’t you? Admit it, stoner!” She reached over and grabbed at him, tickling his sides and giggling.

She still had no idea.

Mike didn’t know whether to be relieved or sick. He grabbed at her hands, pulling her flush against him, and kissed her, sweetly and slowly.

“I think you should start collecting them again.” A change of subject. He didn’t feel like letting her go.

She stiffened in his arms. “You can’t hold onto everything.”

_“Well, don’t eat ‘em all at once.”_

_“It’s too late for that. I’m hooked.”_

“I think some things you can,” he said.

“Then I hope you’re good at being hurt.”

Mike felt his heart tighten in his chest. It was a new feeling. Everything about El felt new, felt good, felt magic. Like the fireflies. “El? I-I’ve never really said this before, but um…” It was now or never. “I think I lo-”  
  
“Whatever it is that you think you want to say to me…” She looked into his eyes, and he couldn’t read her expression anymore. Couldn’t tell if he was with the cool girl or the vulnerable one. “Wait. And if you still wanna tell me when summer’s over, tell me then.”

Mike studied her, his eyes moving over her big brown ones, the long dark-hued lashes that framed them, her nose that ended in a slight upward curve, the heart-shaped lips that parted sweetly for him when he kissed them.

He could wait if she wanted him to. He _would_ wait if she wanted him to. He would wait forever.

-

She was late again.

All that talk about fireflies, and Steve, and then he’d actually tried to tell her that he _loved_ her and it was all too much. Just too, _too_ much.

Because the truth of it was, all the summer birds had said that. Had told her they loved her, had told her they’d never felt that way before, had all said the very same things that he was about to say and had all left when summer ended anyway.

  
She didn’t want him to say it. She didn’t want Mike to be just another summer bird story.

And then she had lost track of the time.

El ran down the familiar side street, a well-worn shortcut that led to the back of her house. Still half-running, she rounded the corner, ready to climb the trellis into her bedroom window… and ran straight into the hefty figure of Jim Hopper.

She startled, jumping back instinctively from her father. “Dad, you scared me.”

He had been outside, waiting for her. He knew.

For once, El was at a loss. She didn’t know what to say. A thousand different and equally shitty excuses ran through her mind. “Dad, I –”

“Of all the boys in this town.” He was just shaking his head at her, like he was so ashamed of her.

Her panic turned to anger.

“What do you care? Why don’t you just go back upstairs and have another six-pack?”

“He sells drugs, kid,” Hop said, his voice cutting through with more clarity than she had heard in years. “He sells drugs with Steve.”

The air caught in El’s throat. She felt like she couldn’t breathe.

“Of all the boys,” he repeated. “Why him?” 


	9. Promotion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm gonna be super busy for the foreseeable future, but I really want to complete this fic. The most realistic way I can do that is to post updates of whatever I can complete, so chapter updates for this thing probably won't be super long. If I wait til I can complete a huge long chapter, I will never update. 
> 
> Also, this is a movie AU, and I follow the basic plot closely. So this fic's ending will have the same basic outcome as the movie's. I know the fic (and the movie itself) started out light hearted and had fluffy moments, but the angst begins NOW. You've been warned.

El twisted the phone cord round and round in her hand. On the other end of the line, his phone was ringing.

What was she going to say once he picked up?

_Are you dealing drugs? Are you a junkie? Is my dad lying, or are you?_

“Hello?”

El’s heart jumped to her throat before she realized it was a woman’s voice. His aunt’s.

“Mrs. Wheeler…. Can I talk to Mike?”

“Oh call me Colleen, honey.” The older woman’s voice sounded chipper on the other end of the line. It was worlds away from the confusing swirl of emotions sinking into the pit of El’s stomach.

“Oh um, Colleen,” El shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “Is Mike there? I need to talk to him.”

“Mike? No, he’s been at Harrington’s repair shop all day, sweetie.” Collen said, casually. Like it was the most normal place in the world for Mike to be. Like Mike _always_ went there. El’s grip around the phone tightened.

“Oh, okay. Is…there something wrong with his car?”

“Oh, probably. Why else would he be there?”

-

Every Thursday night, they’d count their take from the week. 8pm to about midnight, they would meet, count out and divide the cash for the week, offload any leftover product, add it onto the new stuff from Dex, divide that into dime bags, eighths, and zips, and ration out Dex’s share of the profits.

Everything had been laid out in the garage. All the weed, all the money. All in a night’s work. Like clockwork.

Except it was near 10 now, and they hadn’t done shit but argue.

“But it’ll be better because you won’t have to worry about anything anymore,” the kid was insisting. “I’ll deal with all the heavy lifting, and you’ll be like the big boss behind the scenes.”

Steve knew Mikey was trying to spare his feelings. He took another swig from the bottle of Bud, then threw it in the trash. “You’re a shit liar, Mikey. I’m being demoted, is that what you’re telling me?”

“No! It’s just – ” Mike sighed. He wouldn’t look Steve in the eyes. “It’s less customers, less risk Steve. Just like you wanted…”

“You mean just like _you_ wanted,” he snapped. Steve traced a finger over the nearest batch of hundreds, neatly wrapped up in a currency band. He remembered when even just one of these babies would have made it a good week. Now, he threw it onto a pile with the rest. “Did Dex make this decision, or did you ask for it, Mike?”

The kid finally looked up at him, hurt and anger flashing in his eyes. “I didn’t ask for this Steve, I –” Mike was flustered. He ran a shaky hand through his hair. “Listen. You’re not going anywhere, man. We’re still partners. It’ll just be a little different -- ”

The kid stopped midsentence. Suddenly, Mike was looking past him, his mouth hanging open. Like he’d just seen a ghost.

Following his gaze, Steve turned around, and there stood El Hopper, wearing an equally stunned expression.

“I, um, I’m sorry – the door was open and Mike’s aunt said he’d be here and I’m -” El looked from Mike to Steve to the stacks of weed and cash. “I made a mistake.”

Before Steve or the kid could say anything, she turned, bolting out the door.

-

Mike found her seven blocks over, walking by herself in the dark. He pulled the Corvette up, pleading through the rolled down windows.

“El, wait –”

She walked on.

“I can explain, please El – ”

She walked on.

“I’m sorry, okay? Let me – let me at least take you home!”

She ignored him, each and every time.

Finally, he pulled over, nearly falling out the car, stumbling after her.

“Stop – wait! Will you just talk to me? El, _please_!”

“Everything was a lie.” Her voice was small. She had finally stopped walking. “Everything. About not knowing who Steve was, about dealing drugs. You lied,” she spat. “You lied to my face.”

“I’m sorry, El…” Mike trailed off, instinctively searching for words to defend himself and finding none. He didn’t know what to say. But he was desperate. “I know that I hurt you, but I -”

“Stop selling drugs.”

“You know it’s not that simple. How else am I supposed to –”

But she was already turning away again, walking off.

Mike followed after. “El, it’s not like what you think –”

She turned, whirling around on Mike so abruptly he nearly crashed into her. “You’re right. It’s _worse_!” El’s hands were balled into fists at her sides, her pretty face twisted into a look of fury. Mike had never seen her so angry. “You want to take OVER for Steve. He was actually trying to talk you DOWN.”

A wave of shame washed over him, but Mike shook his head. He wasn’t that loser anymore, who always felt ashamed, or guilty, or scared. He wasn’t hurting anyone, he was good at what he did, and he was doing it for _her_. He didn’t have anything to be ashamed of. Did he?

“Oh yeah, and who are you to judge?” Before he could stop himself, he was ranting. “Where do you think the money comes from when I get you nice clothes, and take us out to eat, and pay for your art school application fees?” It felt good in the moment. Some small part of him knew he was really pissed off at himself, but he pushed that away, too. Anger was good. A whole hell of a lot better than the constant guilt and worry he’d been pushing around the entire summer. “You didn’t complain about shit then!”

She looked at him as if she’d just been slapped in the face. The anger drained out of him suddenly, replaced by a hideous sense of regret, by the sure feeling that he’d just lost something he could never get back.

She backed away from him. Like she was afraid of him.

“I don’t know you.”

“El -”

“Leave me alone.”

She turned around, marching quickly down the rest of the street and onto the next block. Mike watched as the slight frame of her figure disappeared into the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So - the movie was about how even nerd "beta" boys have toxic masculinity - and about the consequences of that toxic masculinity. Mike in this AU found a new sense of "coolness" and manhood when he found out he was good at being a "badass" drug dealer type, and he went recklessly all in. People tried to warn him, like Hop, like Steve, and now El. This is Mike's journey into the pitfalls of securing his self-esteem through a reckless and stupid endeavor and he will (and already has) made alot of stupid decisions. If you're reading any of my works, don't expect a fluffy conflict-less portrayal (well except for that one dumb homework fic i wrote but thats besides the point aldsfasldfj). 
> 
> Characters have flaws, Mike has flaws, and that's what's interesting for me to write about. Don't like it, don't read.

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes its hard to keep your motivation up to see a whole thing through. Your comments and kudos really do help to keep the momentum going. Thanks guys!!


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